


i don't love you (but I always will)

by always_a_queen



Series: intertwined [2]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: AND DID I MENTION THERE IS A LOT OF SEX CAUSE THERE'S A LOT OF SEX, Aphrodisiacs, Drug-Induced Sex, F/M, Fuck Or Die, LIKE THERE IS ALSO A LOT OF SEX BUT THERE ARE EVEN MORE FEELINGS THAN THE SEX, Missions Gone Wrong, Porn with Feelings, Sex Pollen, THERE ARE EVEN MORE FEELINGS IN THIS FIC, The Author Regrets Everything, The Author Regrets Nothing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:54:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25073437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/always_a_queen/pseuds/always_a_queen
Summary: Mac shoves his hands down deep in his pockets as he listens to Matty talk about the drug the scientist hit Riley with. He wishes he could shove down the guilt he feels for allowing this to happen in the same way.-Or:i don't have a choice (but I still choose you)from Mac’s point of view. Because clearly I need to love myself more.
Relationships: Riley Davis/Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Series: intertwined [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1815883
Comments: 16
Kudos: 172





	i don't love you (but I always will)

**Author's Note:**

> Same general warning for _I don't have a choice_. In other words: about as consensual as possible as a fuck-or-die trope can be. It should again be noted that Riley is drugged, Mac is sober, but any violation of consent is on the person/persons who drugged Riley, not on Mac. Riley and Mac mutually consent to have sex under the circumstances that they're in, with both of them knowing that Riley's consent is slightly dubious.
> 
> As it's the same set of events as the first fic, reminder that we're still set in sort of a vague end-of-season-3 time where Riley and Billy are over and Mac and Desi are sort of making heart eyes at each other, but aren't together.
> 
> Title is also from Poison and Wine by The Civil Wars.

* * *

Mac shoves his hands down deep in his pockets as he listens to Matty talk about the drug the scientist hit Riley with. He wishes he could shove down the guilt he feels for allowing it to happen in the same way.

He glances back at Riley, sitting at the back of the ambulance, wrapped in a grey blanket, her nose and mouth covered with an oxygen mask. He can see her shaking.

His stomach is twisting. He’s angry and scared, and the more Matty talks the more scared and angry he feels. There’s too much he doesn’t know.

“Have we found anything to indicate they were researching an antidote? An anti-toxin? Anything like that?” He thinks the answer is no, but he needs to ask anyway. 

“Everything we have on this facility was on the hard-drives Riley got out of there,” Matty says. “We’ll get the techs on it, but they’re heavily encrypted, which unfortunately means we’d move a lot faster if we could…”

“...use Riley to help Riley,” Desi finishes. She’s got her arms crossed, feet shoulder width apart. “Well, that sucks.”

“So we’ve got _nothing_ ,” Mac says. “We’ve got pieces of burned paperwork explaining that Riley was dosed with an aphrodisiac, and we’ve got nothing to do but tell her to, what? Go home and ride it out?”

“I don’t think we have any other options,” Matty says. She looks angry, but Mac knows Matty’s anger well, and it’s at the situation, not Riley or Mac or Desi.

Mac thinks about stumbling upon Riley in his kitchen not so long ago, about listening to her and Billy end things. He thinks about hugging her, offering to burn things, promising her they didn’t have to tell Bozer about the break-up right away. As far as he knows, there’s no one she’ll go to, no one she would trust for this and—

The answer hits him square in the jaw. Like one of Jack’s punches. His mind reels with the thought. He solves problems. He solves impossible problems.

He has a knack for not always liking his solutions though, and man, he does _not_ like this one. It makes his insides clench.

“Let me tell her,” he says to Matty. He feels the heat of Desi’s gaze on him, but he doesn’t look at her. “Let me tell her, and let me get her home.”

Matty pinches her lips into a thin line. Her eyes narrow at him, like she knows what he’s _actually_ volunteering to do. “Fine.”

“She might prefer—” Desi starts to say, but Matty holds up her hand, and Desi snaps her mouth shut.

“If she tells Blondie no, then you can make sure she gets home safe,” Matty says. “But I think she’ll let Mac help.”

He tries to pretend that there isn’t a double meaning behind that last word. He tries even harder to pretend that Matty doesn’t _know_ , but she’s Matty. She knows _everything_. Her unspoken blessing is strange to come to grips with though.

Matty passes him keys to one of the SUVs. “Take care of her,” she says, and she meets his eye in a way that says if he steps one toe out of line, she will personally eviscerate him.

Mac breaks away from the group and heads over to Riley. He sits beside her, careful, knowing what he’s about to say may not be well-received. He’s pretty sure _he_ wouldn’t receive it well if roles were reversed.

She pulls the oxygen mask up over her head. “What did she hit me with?”

He probably should have been more prepared to answer that question when he walked over, but he wasn’t. He sighs deeply, and forages ahead anyway, “We’re looking into that. We’ve got some theories, but—”

“Please,” she says through gritted teeth. “Just tell me.”

“It looks like an aphrodisiac,” he tells her. 

He gives her a minute, but she doesn’t say anything more. She starts to stand up. “Fine,” she says through gritted teeth.

Mac reaches for her, fingers brushing against her elbow, and she goes completely, utterly still.

He wants to shake himself. That was _dumb_. It was also unthinkingly cruel of him. 

“Don’t,” she says through clenched teeth. Mac withdraws his hand. 

“I will get a ride home,” she says softly. “I will ride this thing out and it will be fine.”

“Riles,” he says gently. “This is not something you have to handle on your own. Let—”

He puts a hand on her shoulder, then jerks it away like she’s burned him. He needs to stop _doing_ that. He’s not in her situation; he doesn’t know what she’s feeling right now. He has no right to assume or suspect or even to _touch her_.

“Please,” he tries, “Let someone help you.”

She shakes her head and says, almost mournfully, “There’s no one to call, Mac.”

Yeah. He knew that. Which is why he’s over here in the first place. “Then let me help. Don’t go through this alone.”

“I can’t ask you to do that.” 

“You’re not asking,” he says. “I’m offering.”

“I can’t let you—” 

He steps around her quickly and puts his hand to her cheek. As soon as he does it he realizes that he shouldn’t have. He should pull away, he should…

—but she’s leaning into his touch and lifting a hand to press his palm into her skin. So he tries again: “Riley? Can I help you? Is that okay?”

He can see tears in her eyes. He can see the quiver of her lip, the trembling running through her body. She closes her eyes and nods quickly. “Please. Please, take me home, Mac.”

She seems _so_ vulnerable, so scared, that his chest just aches. He nods. “Okay,” he says. “Okay, let’s go.”

She seems a little bit more okay with him touching her, so he wraps an arm tight around her waist and walks in-step with her over to the SUV. He helps her climb into the passenger’s seat, then jogs around the vehicle to the driver’s side. His brain is spinning faster than he would like it to be.

Mac starts the car and then asks, “My place or yours?” It’s a roundabout way of getting her permission again. If she says her place, she may want him to go. If she says his place—

“Doesn’t matter,” she says. The shock blanket and her leather jacket are already in his backseat, and she’s peeling off the top layer of tank tops she’s wearing. 

“Riles?” he says, trying to stop staring at the small sliver of skin between the lower hem of her shirt and the line of her jeans.

“Doesn’t matter,” she says again. “We’re gonna have a problem if we don’t get there soon.”

It’s the first time she’s acknowledged aloud that the drug is affecting her. He’d assumed, from observing her expressions, her reactions to his touch, the dilation of her pupils, the quickness of her breathing, that it was working on her, but hearing it quietly confirmed is a little more terrifying. He doesn’t feel like he can get a good read on what’s going on in her head. He can usually read Riley like a well-worn book. He _knows_ her.

But it feels like he’s looking at her all off-centered and out of focus. She seems blurry and distorted, and he can’t put his thumb onto anything specific beyond _she’s currently drugged_.

Mac flicks on the red and blue lights on top of the vehicle and drives right past a stop sign. He chances a quick glance at Riley. He can see sweat beading on her brow. Her eyes are closed and her nails are digging into her thighs over the material of her jeans.

His place is closer. Mac doesn’t even think through the implications of that. He just needs her safe. His place is safe. He rubs the back of his neck, fighting worry.

There wasn’t a long period of time for him to look into what exactly was in the compound she was injected with, but there were papers on the results. Mac hopes Matty forwards them to him as soon as possible. He wants to know so much more about what they’re dealing with.

He glances over at Riley again. One thing at a time. First thing is to get this _thing_ under control.

No, no, the first thing is to _help_ Riley. However she needs.

Mac pulls up his own driveway and parks. When he opens Riley’s door for her, she practically falls into his arms as she gets out of the SUV.

He doesn’t really have to think about scooping her up to get her inside. She wraps her arms around him and holds tight, and he tries not to think about whatever wicked things the aphrodisiac is doing to her right now.

Unlocking the house and turning off the alarm are feats he’ll never know how he managed. He thinks through possible locations with Riley in his arms, and then just gives up and settles on the bedroom. It’s probably as good a place as any. 

Carefully, Mac helps her sit on the bed, trying to think of what will make her comfortable. He drops to his knees in front of her and begins to unlace her combat boots. Setting them aside, he looks up at her and asks, “Socks?”

She nods. Mac swallows thickly and peels off her socks one-by-one. He can’t help but notice the way his fingers brush against her skin. He rolls the socks together and puts them inside one of her boots. 

She’s hyperventilating. He’s been paying very close attention to her breathing ever since he set her down.

“Riles,” he says, “You’ve got to breathe for me, okay? What do you need?”

He feels so lost. He just needs a direction. A way to help. And he doesn’t even remotely know how to determine that on his own, without her input. 

When she speaks, her voice is paper thin and colored with nerves and fear. “Can you just—Can you hold me?”

“Yeah,” he says. He’d do anything for her. Holding her is easy. “Yeah, I can do that.”

Mac takes off his own shoes—seems like it’ll be more comfortable that way—and sets to work creating a soft mountain of pillows against the headboard. He settles back against them, spreading his legs a little.

He doesn’t have words for the moment when Riley crawls over to him, sinking into his arms like she’s always belonged there.

He’s held her before, of course. He hugged her a while ago when she’d confessed to feeling lost after ending things with Billy.

This is different. He draws her in close. She puts her back to his chest and sinks back against him, and he can feel the heat of her. She’s burning up. He puts a hand to her forehead, feeling heat and sweat. He rests his other hand against her abdomen.

Mac brushes her hair off of her forehead and out of her eyes. 

“Okay?” he asks. He thinks it must be, but he doesn’t dare to assume.

“Yeah.” She turns her head to the side, and he hears the jaggedness of her breath. He can feel her shaking, trembling in his arms.

It stands to reason, Mac thinks, that if she could calm down enough to touch herself it might ease her symptoms. If she could even get to the point of orgasm the flood of oxytocin and dopamine in her system could act as a reset switch on the drug. 

She’s not going to get there if she doesn’t calm down. Mac lowers his head a little, putting his lips right by her ear. “Riles, I need you to breathe with me.”

“Can’t,” her voice is so _small_ and scared. “Mac, I can’t.”

She needs to calm down, and touch will help with that. Mac runs his right hand down the length of her arm. “Shhh, I’ve got you. It’s easy. Feel it with me. Feel me breathe.”

Every breath is still too shallow, too fast.

“Nice, deep breath in with me, Riles. C’mon.” He makes a point of making his inhale audible. “Good, Riles. That’s good.” 

She squirms against him, and for one moment, his mind goes completely blank. When his attention snaps back into focus, he vows to file _that_ little bit of information in the back of his mind for a time when it’s useful.

“Now let it out,” he says. “With me—here.” He blows out, counting to five in his head.

She does, and her next breath in is slow and deep. She follows it with another breath out, and Mac feels the tension leaving his body. Good. She’s got this. He can help her.

“Just like that,” he encourages. “Just like that. You’re doing fine. You’re gonna be fine—” and then the question he’s not sure how to ask comes out as: “What do you need next?”

“Jeans off.” She’s panting as she undoes the button and slides down the zipper.

Mac has to close his eyes in order to keep his composure when she lifts up her hips to slide the jeans down her legs. He gets a glimpse of smooth skin, and a flash of hot pink lace before he tears his eyes away.

Riley kicks off her pants and Mac keeps his eyes focused on the ceiling. He tries to distract himself with thoughts of how maybe he should take apart his ceiling fan. He doesn’t think it’s running optimally and—

Riley’s leaning forward, going to unhook her bra, and suddenly Mac finds himself taking her wrists gently. “I got it,” he tells her. It’s just three little eyehooks and undoing them is a cinch. His fingers brush her skin, and he hears her sharp intake of breath.

He makes a note of that. Maybe physical contact with another person helps? She slides the bra out from beneath her tank top and lays back against him. One of her hands creeps up beneath the hem of her tank top and grasps her breast.

Mac looks back up at the ceiling, trying to focus on something else, while at the same time hyper aware of every movement Riley makes against him. She wraps her fingers around his wrist and pulls his arm firmly around her waist.

“Talk to me?” she asks, and Mac tears his eyes away from her hand on his arm. “Mac?”

He can do that. He can talk to her. He’s just, he’s watching her pinch her nipples and listening to her pant and feeling her body writhe against his.

He clears his throat, and starts with the first thing that comes to mind: “When, uh, when the… the female body is aroused, it does this thing called tenting, where the cervix rises up and the vagina walls thicken and lubricate, to prepare for insertion. The clitoris actually gets erect, and it sinks back beneath the clitoral hood. The nerves in the clitoris actually wrap all the way around the vagina, which is why some scientists think that both vaginal and clitoral orgasm are actually both clitoral orgasms.”

One of her hands slides past the lace hem of her panties, and he can’t tell what she does, but it makes her moan. Mac holds onto her a little tighter, trying to ignore the way that sound hits him right in the gut. He wants to fix it, make it better, but all he can do is hold her through it.

“I’d say we’re definitely hitting all of those descriptions,” she says roughly.

“Yeah?” He tries not to let how this is affecting him show in his voice, but he fails. She doesn’t seem to notice. She also doesn’t seem to notice that he’s not exactly physically unaffected either. “Good. That’s good. Tell me where you’re at?”

“Touching helps. Feels good. Feels like I’m going to die if something doesn’t, ah—” She cuts off with a cry and he tenses. First, because that sounded more like pain than pleasure, and second because too much of his blood is rushing south. He really hopes she doesn’t notice that. This is strictly about making sure she’s safe and okay and gets through this.

This is not about his body’s biological responses to arousing stimuli. It’s just not.

Her fingers tighten on his arm, her nails digging in. “It’s okay. It’s good; it’s good, Mac.”

It doesn’t sound good, but he’s not the one drugged, so—

“Touching helps?” he asks softly. 

“Yeah.” She whimpers.

“Keep touching then,” he tells her. He bends his head down. She smells like sweat and shampoo, something fruity. It’s familiar. He’s hugged Riley enough times to recognize it. He presses his lips to her skin, kissing softly, hoping maybe his touch helps too.

“I’m right here,” he says evenly. “I’ve got you, and you’re safe with me. You’re safe, Riles.”

“I think,” she says, “I think I’m going to—”

He wishes he could touch her more, help her more. He slides his arm up her stomach a bit, keeps her close. What can he do? What can he give her?

_Talk_ , she had asked, so he does.

“I’ve got you,” he says again. He lets his gaze drift down, past the view of her nipples pebbled beneath her shirt to where her hand dips below hot pink lace. “It’s okay. It’s okay, you can come. Come just like this. Come in my arms.”

Riley arches her back and _screams_. When she comes down, she falls back against him, gulping down three huge breaths. The third turns into a sob that Mac swears shreds his insides. 

She turns over in his arms, grabbing fistfulls of his shirt. He keeps his arms around her as she cries heaving sobs that shake through her whole body.

He shushes her, rubbing her back with his hands, holding her close. Mac closes his eyes. She shouldn’t be dealing with this. This never should have happened, he never should have—

She shoves at his chest, scrambling away from him. Mac watches as she just sits for a moment, staring down at his comforter. The makeup around her eyes is smeared and there are tear-tracks down her face. 

“I should go,” she says quietly, keeping her gaze down. 

That’s a _terrible_ idea, but Mac doesn’t say so. She seems so… lost. Skittish. The drug might be fading, but now they have to deal with the reality of what’s just happened. 

“Slow down,” Mac says, “Take a breath.” He catches her by the arm before she can scramble off of the bed. She freezes, and he winces as he climbs off of the bed. He has _got_ to stop touching her while this drug could still be in her system. She’s not pulling away though, so he lets his hand linger.

“Let me get you some water. Just, rest a minute.” She looks hesitant, so he follows up with, “Please.”

As soon as he’s out of the room, he falls back against the door and tries to just breathe. His body is burning, but he shuts his eyes tightly and wills himself to _stop_. It doesn’t work as well as he wishes it would. It’s like his brain has the way she sounds on repeat, the way her body moved against him.

What pulls him back is remembering the way she cried. The way this has been a violation of her, of her choices, of her _body_. In normal circumstances… this wouldn’t be happening.

Feeling like he’s wading through jello, Mac heads for the kitchen. He fills a glass with water and a few ice cubes, then stops in the hallway bathroom, flicks on the hot water in the sink, and wets a washcloth. 

When he returns, Riley is right where he left her, pillow clutched to her chest. He offers the glass and the washcloth, and she takes the washcloth. 

“I’m sorry,” she says, using the cloth to wipe at her makeup. “God, Mac, I am so sorry.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” the words come out in a rush, quiet and quick. “This is not your fault. Do you hear me?”

“I could’ve…” She trails off.

“I could have too,” he says quickly. “I could have not left you alone in there. I could have done things differently, but we’re here now. And what happened was not your fault.”

He really needs her to look at him. He needs to see her eyes. Mac puts a crooked finger beneath her chin to tilt up her face. He doesn’t think about the words he says next, they just come out of his mouth: “You are so important to me, Riles. You have no idea.”

Mac opens his arms, and it tugs at something deep inside his heart that Riley doesn’t even hesitate before she moves forward into his embrace. She slides her arms around his middle and puts her cheek to his chest.

“I don’t want this to change anything,” she says quietly.

“It won’t,” he says, only half believing it, especially when his brain seems to want to play the sounds she made on a never ending loop. “Not if we don’t want it to.”

“Mac,” Riley says slowly, “I think maybe it’s starting again?”

He pulls back just enough to look down at her. “What?”

“I feel all…” She shakes her head. “I still feel weird. Achy. Like my skin is too tight.”

Fuck. _Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck._ That’s fast. That’s _really_ fast. That’s going to cause some problems. Especially if she’s still sensitive. Women have a different refractory period, but he had absolutely expected that either an orgasm would completely neutralize the drug, or that it would at least give Riley longer than _ten minutes_ to recover and take a breath.

Yet again, Mac curses their lack of information. If they’d drawn out her plateau more before her climax, would she have a longer refractory period? 

“Let me call Matty, see if they’ve found out anything more about what you were hit with.”

She shifts her weight from foot to foot. “I can handle this one on my own.”

He wants to grab her by the shoulders and shake her and remind her that _she doesn’t have to_. She’s not alone. She doesn’t have to do this alone.

“Hey,” he says, touching her shoulder lightly. “We’ve been over this. I’m not going to just leave you. Be right back.”

Mac closes the door behind him as he fishes out his phone and dials Matty.

Matty doesn’t even say hello. “How is she?”

His mouth refuses to say the word _fine_. He tries to think of a way to phrase what happened that won’t embarrass Riley or scar Matty. No sufficient options come to mind. “We need to know what you found out about that compound she was injected with,” he says instead.

“But she’s...” 

Matty trails off, so Mac finishes for her, because clearly this is not a statement either of them want to say out loud. “As okay as possible, given the circumstances.”

“And you’re still with her?” Concern colors Matty’s voice.

Mac gives up. “You and I both know that I was never gonna leave her.”

Silence. Then—

“It’s not _good_ , Mac,” Mattie says. “We’ve got the lab notes on test subjects that were injected with the same compound.”

Mac pinches the bridge of his nose. “And?”

Matty speaks in short, terse sentences, and Mac files away the information she tells him in neat little bullet points.

One, most subjects experienced the effects of the aphrodisiac for as little as forty-eight hours and as many as seventy-two hours.

Two, there was, in most subjects, a variance in refractory periods, with some lasting as long as six hours and some lasting a mere handful of minutes. 

Three, some people died if climax wasn’t reached in some abstract amount of time that varied from person to person. This was discovered when they tested the drug on at least two subjects who were strapped down and not allowed stimulation. 

Four, the women had it worse than the men. By _staggering_ numbers. The drug stayed in their system longer, they reported that the sensations were physically painful, and their refractory period was shorter.

“Thanks, Matty,” Mac says. “Let me know what else you find?”

“Of course,” she answers. “Make sure Riley is okay.”

“Will do.” Mac taps the red circle on his phone and slides it back into his pocket. He shoves a hand into his hair and tugs, just a little. Shit, shit, _shit_.

When he enters the bedroom again, he finds Riley sitting on the mattress with her knees pulled up to her chest. He sits beside her.

“It’s not good, Riley.”

She doesn’t look at him. “Coulda told you that.”

“The good news is it will wear off. The bad news is it could be anywhere from forty-eight to seventy-two hours.”

“The fuck? What kind of absolute monster created this shit?” 

“Not a clue.” Gently, Mac places a hand on her back. 

She keeps her head down. “So I have to deal with this shit for another two days?”

Mac sighs. “At least. We’re gonna figure this out, though. The first step is to slow down the time between… uh…”

“Needing to come so badly I can’t think straight?” she turns her head to look at him.

Her words hit him in the gut. Mac rubs the back of his neck. “Yep. That. We need to slow that down.”

“Alright, science guy,” Riley says, through jagged breaths. “What do you suggest?”

He grins, just a little. He can’t help it. He has an _idea_. He’s not sure how much Riley is going to _like_ it, but it is arguably an idea. “We’ve established that you trust me, right?”

“Think so,” she replies, but he catches the teasing in it. 

“Right then.” For a second, he contemplates telling her his plan, but then he changes his mind. Standing, Mac pulls off his long-sleeved shirt.

“Mac,” Riley says. “You really think the solution to slowing this down is for you to remove clothes.”

“I have a theory,” he says, pulling off his tee-shirt next and setting both it and the flannel down on a nearby chair. “And you said you trust me.”

She frowns. “I do, but…”

Mac unzips his jeans and starts shoving them down his legs, taking his socks along with them. Then, he crawls into bed with her. 

“Come here,” Mac says, drawing her close to him. “Skin-to-skin contact can slow your heart rate, lower your anxiety, and help you rest.”

He settles her against his chest, trying hard to ignore the way her legs brush against his. His hand hovers over her back for a moment, but then he reminds himself the _point_ is skin-to-skin, and that doesn’t work as well when she’s still wearing her shirt. Reaching down, he slips a hand beneath her shirt to start pulling it up.

“Mac,” she says against his chest, “Are you sure?”

Not remotely, but he can’t tell her that. 

“You’ve got this,” he says. “Just close your eyes and breathe easy.”

He tosses her shirt aside, and then it’s just her skin against his. He watches as her eyes drift shut, feels her exhale against his chest.

Mac lets his fingers trail down her spine and then back up. He thinks about overstimulation and about everything Matty’s told him about this drug, but also everything he knows about sex and arousal. When the human body is aroused, heart rate and breathing speed up. It stands to reason, then, that they can keep the drug from ripping it’s way through her system by keeping her still and her breathing slow. He just needs to help her relax.

And he needs to give her an outlet for when she needs it. He shifts beneath her, maneuvering his leg between hers. She makes a tiny sound, halfway between a moan and a cry. Her eyes fly open. He moves again, making soft shushing noises.

“If you get to the point where you need to touch,” he says quietly, “grind down on my thigh, okay? The indirect stimulation will build you up slower and it won’t be as hard on sensitive areas.”

She hums against his skin. He brushes his hand across her head, smoothing back her hair. 

“For now,” Mac says, “Just breathe easy and close your eyes.”

“Can you keep talking?” Riley says. “It’s distracting.”

All things considered, it’s probably the least he can do. “Sure,” he says. “What do you want me to talk about?”

“Anything,” she answers, tilting her chin just a little to look up at him. “Tell me about anything.”

He drags his eyes away from all of her skin, from the bare expanse of her back, the black and pink of her underwear, then the long lines of her legs. He rests his head back against the headboard.

He can talk to her. He _can_. Mac flips through stories in his head, finally settling on one of his and Jack’s first missions together. He’s not sure how well she’s able to pay attention, but having his hand on her back helps him keep time with how she’s breathing.

He tells her what little he remembers of his mom, before she died, how she baked those cheap Pillsbury cinnamon rolls on Saturday mornings and let him conduct experiments with vinegar and baking soda, mentos and coke. He avoids talking about his father.

He tells her stories about him and Bozer, high school and prom and the girl Mac liked. He thinks about telling her how he used to spend time making up science-y pick up lines, but figures now’s probably not the time.

At some point, she starts rocking her hips against him. He bends his knee and lets her take whatever she needs. He hears her muttering curses. Mac bites his lip and strokes her hair, remembers Matty telling him that the women said this drug was painful. He rubs her back, hoping the touch is soothing. 

“You’re safe,” he tells her. “I’m right here; I’ve got you.”

She grinds down on his thigh and mutters a litany of _fucks_. Mac’s blood rushes right to his dick, and he grits his teeth. It’s a physical reaction, he tells himself, even as Riley tenses beneath his hands. He strokes down her back with his fingertips, whispering softly to her that she’s okay, she’s good.

When she comes, it sounds more like she’s in pain than anything else. Mac can’t get that thought out of his head. He hates this drug, he hates that this is happening to her, and he hates feeling so unable to do anything to actually _help_.

She slumps down against his chest. Mac breathes out slow, and he feels her mimic it. He’s hard and aching, but that feels like more of an inconvenience than anything else.

Mac lets his head thump back on the headboard. Relief seeps into him slowly. They should have a little bit of a break now. 

When Riley falls asleep, it takes a few minutes for him to realize it. Her eyes are closed, her breathing has evened out. Mac lays there with her for a while longer, but when he figures out that she’s entered a deeper REM cycle, he carefully extricates himself from her embrace. He pauses before he climbs all the way out of bed, stopping to slide a pillow beneath her head.

She’s rolled onto her side, and the shift shows off her chest and toned stomach. He can see the darker skin of her areolae surrounding each nipple. He averts his eyes, then grabs a throw blanket from his closet and drapes it over her body.

He gives thought, for a few minutes, as to what she’ll need when she wakes. He decides that something to drink and some painkillers are probably the most important. Moving quickly and quietly, Mac leaves a bottle of Aspirin and a glass of orange juice on the nightstand for her. 

He’s very careful not to wake her as he closes the door to the bedroom behind him.

He calls Matty again. He’s light on the details, just tells her that Riley is asleep and is fine for now.

“Can you send a copy of the lab notes to my laptop?” he asks.

“Already done,” Matty tells him. “I’m sending an agent to Riley’s place to pick up some clothes. They’ll bring some toiletries too.”

“Good,” Mac frowns at his empty fridge. He gave the last of his OJ to Riles. He settles on an apple from a back shelf.

He hangs up with Matty a few minutes later. There’s not really anything more to say.

Mac starts poking around the files Riley got out of the lab. He doesn’t find much more than he already knows. He checks on Riley periodically, but she’s out like a light, so he lets her sleep.

It takes another forty-five minutes of sifting through files before Mac takes a break. He picks up the top book from the stack on his coffee table and tries to remember where he was a few days ago.

But now that he’s not trying to solve the puzzle of the aphrodisiac, his brain doesn’t want to focus on something as trivial as electrical engineering. It wants to think about Riley.

It wants to think about the picture of her in his bed, practically naked. It wants to think about her soft moans, or the feel of her skin beneath his palms.

He thinks about holding her after she ended things with Billy, of the way she’d cried into his shirt, laughed through her tears at his dumb jokes about burning things. He thinks about how he told her she was important to him, so important, without even really thinking about it beforehand.

The door to the bedroom creaks open, and Mac looks up as Riley enters. Wearing his shirt.

Wearing _only_ his shirt.

Something low in his gut clenches tightly. He swallows, hard. Not just because Riley is the most stunning woman he’s ever seen in his life, even when handcuffed to a table and wearing a gaudy shade of orange, but also because it’s _his_ shirt.

There’s something oddly intimate about it. 

“Hey,” he says. “How are you feeling?”

Riley shrugs, rubbing her arms absently. “A little more normal. How long was I out?”

“Couple hours.” Mac draws his legs back from the couch to make room for her to sit. 

She curls up on the opposite side, close to the armrest. “Maybe that means we’re lengthening the time between episodes?”

“Maybe.” Closing his book Mac leans over to set it on the side table. “I hope so.”

She taps her fingers anxiously on her bare thigh. “Any more news?”

He shakes his head. “No, not yet.”

He doesn’t bring up the files. It’s not like there’s anything there that’s new. Just more of the same, over and over again with different subjects. And he doesn’t want to scare her. Not when there’s no reason to.

“Then I guess, what? Four hours down? Forty-four to go?” She winces. “I don’t know how to do this, Mac.”

Honestly? Mac can’t say he knows either. He just knows that he can’t leave her to deal with this alone. He clears his throat. “Let’s look at it this way, we made it through four hours. We’ll make it through four hours more, and then four after that.”

Which, mathematically, is only twelve of their possible seventy-two hours, but Mac decides to avoid that. Instead he catches himself looking at Riley, wondering how it’s possible for her to be so strong given the circumstances.

Riley lifts her glass of juice to her lips. 

“Thank you,” she says quietly. “I don’t think I said it earlier.”

He stares at her in disbelief. “You don’t have to thank me, Riles.”

“Feel like I do.” He watches as she picks idly at the hem of his shirt.

“Well,” Mac says, and his hands itch to touch her, to hold her again, if only for a moment. “For the record, you don’t.”

She grins. “So you’d be just as accommodating for Bozer or Jack?”

Mac laughs, right from his gut, imagining it. “Let’s just be glad neither Bozer nor Jack are in this situation, and we don’t have to find out.”

It seems like a good time for a distraction, so Mac grabs the Switch controller from the coffee table.

“Mario Kart?” he offers.

“Sure. I’m happy to kick your ass at Mario Kart.” It’s spoken like everything is normal, teasing, playful.

He can hear the anxiety and nerves and fear beneath it though. Still, he plays along, making a face at her. “You’ve never kicked my ass at Mario Kart.”

She has. She 100% has. He doesn’t think he’s ever actually won against her. 

“You crazy?” She takes the controller he offers her. Their fingers brush. “I have always crushed you at this game.”

The first indication that something is wrong is when Mac hits Riley’s racer with a blue shell and it doesn’t quite seem to register. The second is when she drops from first to fourth and can’t seem to catch up again. 

He doesn’t know what to do, how exactly to help, so he gets off the couch and settles himself on the floor. He reaches for Riley’s hand, and guides her down to sit between his legs. She leans back against his chest and he holds the controller in front of her. 

They do a couple more circuits. Riley keeps losing. 

Finally she sets aside her controller and turns over in Mac’s arms. He wraps his arms around her, holding her close. Her hands grip her thighs and her nails dig in. 

“I can’t, Mac,” she whines. “It hurts.”

He knows. He can tell. If not from the files he’s read about the drug, but also from the pitch of her voice. He can _hear_ the pain she’s in.

He just doesn’t know what to do about it, besides—

“Let me help?” he asks quietly.

She nods. “Please.”

For a second, he’s not sure where to start, how to touch her. She said yes to his help, but he doesn’t know what all her _yes_ entails.

He raises one hand and lets it hover just slightly over her right breast. She lets go of his thigh and covers his hand with hers, pressing it against her and arching into his touch. The sound that comes out of her mouth goes right to his cock, but Mac ignores it in favor of moving his hand to her other breast.

How does he do this? How does he help her without taking something both of them will regret later? Something that can’t actually even be given?

He doesn’t know, but she’s flushed and shaking and he needs to do _something_.

He swears he’s going to go to hell. If he’s not there already.

Mac slides his hand between her legs, keeping the barrier of her panties between his skin and hers. She rolls her hips, and he matches her movements, slow and easy. 

And she’s wearing his fucking shirt. It’s like some cruel twisted joke.

She grabs his wrist and pulls his hand away from her body, but then she helps him slide his fingers beneath the lace band of her panties. She’s wet. He closes his eyes and reminds himself it’s the drug. Still. She’s hot and wet, and she makes an absolutely desperate sound when he brushes against her clit. 

Now that he’s found it, he doesn’t put any direct stimulation on it. He circles. He taps. He does feather-light touches. With his other hand, he reaches beneath her shirt and cups her breast again, brushing a thumb against her nipple.

It doesn’t take long after that. He holds her as she comes, and he holds her as she comes down. 

“You’re good,” he says softly. “You’re good. You’re okay.”

“I swear, Mac,” she cries. “It’s painful.”

“I’m sorry.” He holds her tighter. He doesn’t want her to hurt. “I’m so, so sorry. We’ll figure out something different for the next one, okay?”

He adjusts her carefully on his lap, swinging her legs over to one side. Her arms come up around his neck, and she hides her face in his shoulder. 

After a few minutes, he stands up with her in his arms and sets her down gently on the couch. He brings her a glass of water and then goes to refill it once it’s empty. 

In the kitchen, Mac pauses. He wants to hit something. Or strangle someone. Or do anything other than go back into that room and have to face Riley while she’s so....

Vulnerable.

He’s not used to Riley being vulnerable like this. He’s used to her being stressed, frustrated, intense, and all kinds of other things.

But he’s never seen her this vulnerable before.

Mac pulls himself together and goes back into the living room. She beats him twice more at Mario Kart. They spend the rest of the afternoon playing video games until Mac takes a break to call in an order for Thai food.

He’s just finished rattling off his address when Riley comes up behind him and wraps her arms around his waist. He covers her joined hands at his middle with his own and sighs.

She doesn’t have to say anything for him to know it’s started back up again. He hangs up and turns around to wrap his arms around her more easily.

What to do, what to do?

There are a _lot_ of ways to have sex. A lot of ways to get someone off. He flips through a couple of possibilities in his mind and finally says: “I have a thought? If you’re okay with it?”

“I’m okay with it.” She says the words too quickly. It’s the drug, but it’s also a yes. He takes both factors into consideration. 

“Okay.” He swallows. Hard. “Okay.”

He takes her hand and starts to lead her towards the bedroom. She lets her arm extend all the way and allows him to give her hand a slight tug before she moves to follow.

Mac helps her onto the bed, tucking a pillow beneath her head and moving away the blanket he used to cover her with earlier. Then he sits beside her. He touches her cheek with the backs of his fingers, and she turns into his touch.

He keeps his touch light as he runs his fingers down her neck, down her sternum, to the first button on the shirt she wears. _His_ shirt. He undoes the top button, then the few below it. He doesn’t push the sides of the shirt away, just leaves it open a few inches. He can see from her neck down to past her belly button, to the hem of her panties, but her breasts are still covered.

Goosebumps break out across her skin, following his touch. He puts a palm to her thigh, coaxing her legs to spread, then he moves down the bed to settle between them. He keeps his weight on his forearms, careful not to crush her.

He should just get started. It’s not like she’s going to need a lot of foreplay with the aphrodisiac, but maybe _he_ does. He lowers his head, softly brushing his lips against the skin of her neck. Then he moves to the other side.

She grabs his forearms and digs her nails in. Mac keeps kissing her, down her sternum, above her belly button, nosing aside the shirt to reveal more skin.

When he gets to the hem of her underwear, he passes over them in favor of lifting one of her legs up and kissing the inside of her thigh. 

He loses track, a little bit. Her skin is soft, and she smells good, and she makes these tiny little whimpers beneath his hands, because of him, in response to him. God, it’s like he can’t think.

He lowers his head between her thighs and kisses her over her panties. She arches her back, lifting her hips, pushing into his mouth, heels digging into his back.

And he thinks that maybe, dragging this on any longer would be cruel to both of them. He pulls back long enough to slowly pull her underwear off.

He kisses back up her thigh, and he’s so, so careful when he finally puts his mouth against her sex. And he has to reevaluate everything. There’s nothing simple about this. This is complicated and intense and intimate. He kisses her all over, drags his tongue up over her labia in smooth, even strokes. He reaches up, across her body, and finds her hand. She wraps her fingers around his and holds tight, even as he lifts her leg over his shoulder while he licks at her clit. 

Her thumb rubs across the back of his hand. The caress is so unnecessary, so completely innocent compared to everything else he’s doing to her.

She bucks her hips, once, so Mac puts an arm across her stomach to hold her still. 

“Will you... fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck… ” She gasps and raises her hips against his arm again. “Will you… Would you… would you fuck me with your fingers?”

He hums against her clit. He doesn’t want to let go of her hand, so he moves his arm from her waist and moves his fingers to her entrance. She’s slick and ready and it barely takes anything to slip his forefinger inside of her. 

“Yeah,” she whispers, breathy. “Yeah, like that. Please.”

Experimenting, he thrusts in and out slowly, punctuating the motion by licking her clit. She clenches around him, and he takes that as encouragement to keep going. 

It doesn’t take long after that. Suddenly she’s twisting and writhing, and letting out a scream. He files that little bit of knowledge away, for _what_ , he’s not entirely sure, but he does. Mac eases her through it, and when she’s collapsed into a heap, he turns his head to kiss the inside of her thigh.

He stares up at her, watching as her chest rises and falls. She looks down at him, and their eyes meet. And Mac has no idea what to say to her. He doesn’t know what he’s feeling, or what he’s thinking.

He just knows that they’re still holding hands. And he doesn’t want to let go.

He’s saved by the literal bell.

“That’s the Thai food,” he says. “You okay for the moment?”

She nods, and he steps out of the room, pausing in the bathroom to wash his hands before he gets the Thai from his usual delivery guy and passes him a few bills.

He stops _back_ in the bathroom to run a washcloth beneath the hot water for Riley. When he steps back into the bedroom, she’s buttoned up her shirt and is hugging a pillow to her chest. Mac sets the food down beside her and carefully puts the washcloth between her legs.

“This should help a little,” he says.

And then, because he’s really not sure what else to do or say, he breaks into the pad Thai, passing Riley a container and a fork. 

Eventually, he scoots back to the headboard to be more comfortable, and they eat sitting side-by-side.

“No one in the tests they did for this stupid fucking drug went insane, did they?” Riley asks Mac.

“Not that I am aware of,” he says around a mouthful of vegetables, shrimp, and rice noodles. “The only reported death were subjects who, well, were restrained throughout.”

“I couldn’t have done this alone,” she says quietly. “I really couldn’t have.”

He knows, that’s the scary thing. He’s read enough of the files, seen enough of the data. He puts a hand on her shoulder. 

This break is longer. Mac keeps track. They finish dinner, play three games of checkers on the bed, and then move to the living room to watch a few episodes of Mythbusters.

After the first episode, Mac hooks an arm around Riley’s waist and tugs her into his arms. He keeps his arms low around her waist, closer to her hips, but at some point during the second episode she takes his hand in hers and places it over her breast.

Something is exploding on screen because of _science,_ but Mac’s distracted kissing Riley’s neck and rubbing her nipples through her shirt. (It’s one of her shirts. She changed after dinner. He’d be lying if he said that wasn’t a little disappointing. He’s trying not to dwell, now isn’t the time for it.)

He’s expecting to do much of what he’s done before: touch her where she needs him, talk her through it, remind her that she’s safe.

That’s why it surprises him so much when she turns over in his lap, kneeling on the couch cushions. He furrows his brows at her, but then she’s whispering: “Can I touch you?”

For a second, Mac stops breathing. He heard the words just fine, but it takes their implication some time to sink in.

If he says yes, this won’t be because of the drug, not really. He doesn’t need this from her, not in the way she needs it, not because....

He thinks for too long. Riley shakes her head, crestfallen. “Never, never mind, I shouldn’t have—”

Mac cuts her off by grabbing both of her hands in his. “You can touch me, Riles. It’s okay.”

He pulls her hands down, placing her palms over his chest. He has not thought this through. He has _so_ not thought this through. Her hands are right over his heart, and it’s _racing_. 

She touches her forehead to his. She’s so close to him. “Can I take off your shirt?” 

This is a bad idea. This is a bad, _bad_ idea. And yet, he doesn’t want to tell her no. Not just because he _does_ want her to take off his shirt, but because he wants to give her what she needs.

And maybe he’s correct in his hypothesis that touching other people helps dim the effects of the aphrodisiac? There’s only one way to find out. 

“Yeah,” he says roughly. “Yeah, go ahead.”

Mac leans forward and lifts his arms to make it easier for her to pull the white tee-shirt up and over his head. She tosses it aside. 

Riley keeps her face close to his, eyes staring into his own as she puts her hands to his shoulders, running her fingers along his collarbone. She traces a path down the center of his chest.

He wants to kiss her. It would be so easy. So simple. He would barely have to move his head, tip his chin up. He _wants_ to kiss her. 

That’s a new thought. That’s a different thought. He cares about Riley. He likes being around Riley. He cares so much that he can’t even bear the thought of letting her go through this alone. 

It’s hard to think about that when Riley tips her head to the side, nuzzling her face against his neck and kissing him there. She moves to straddle him, a knee on either side of his body. Her lips move up to his earlobe, then find the line of his jaw. Mac lets his mouth fall open, and he draws in a deep breath.

His hands find the hem of her shirt, and he slides them up beneath it, finding soft, warm skin. He rubs his thumbs against her ribcage. He has the urge to raise his hands up more, cup her breasts, but he’s distracted from that when Riley runs her teeth across his skin.

It’s impossible to help the way he snaps his hips up in response. For a fleeting moment he wonders how on _earth_ she knew to do that, but then she’s running her nails down his chest, and fuck he is _never_ going to be able to even so much as _look_ at Riley’s hands again without remembering the sensation.

There’s a slow roll of her hips against his, and he whispers, “Riles,” in response.

“Stop me before I go too far,” she says. “Please? I can’t think and I’m so lost and I just…”

She trails off, shifting her hips against his in a way that should be illegal. He glances down at the top of her head as she kisses a path down his chest. 

He _should_ tell her to stop. He doesn’t want her to stop. That’s new, and confusing. He doesn’t _need_ this.

Except his body is screaming that he does. He _does_ want this. He _does_ want her. He’s not drugged, he’s not going to die if he doesn’t get off.

He’s going to have go figure this out later, but for right now he wants her.

Especially not now that her hands are on his belt buckle.

“Don’t stop,” he hears himself tell her. “I don’t want you to stop.”

She unbuckles his belt.

Taking off his pants is an exercise in teamwork and patience, but once they're on the floor she stares at him for a long moment.

He still doesn’t say no. He’s scared of the fact that he wants to say yes. 

She meets his gaze and for a moment he thinks maybe she’s scared too. Maybe they’re both diving headfirst into something that they don’t completely understand.

“Can I?” she asks quietly, slipping a finger beneath the band of his underwear..

He lifts a hand, cupping her cheek. She leans into his touch in a way that makes his heart skip a beat. God, he wants to kiss her. He doesn’t. “Go ahead.”

She pulls down the boxer-briefs. Mac feels some emotion he can’t identify lodged in his throat. His chest is tight. He watches her, holding himself still as a stone as she grabs the bottle of lube from the coffee table and pours a little into her hand.

Another pause, a glance down at her hand, then at his dick, then back up at him.

“Please.” The word is out of his mouth before he can really think about it. 

She’s so careful when she touches him, the stroke of one finger from the tip of him down the length. Mac slams his eyes shut and works to keep his hips still even though every part of his body is screaming to move them.

But then Riley’s hand is on his, and she moves it on top of her own. He understands. He always understands her, it seems. 

Riley’s a quick learner in all things, but even drugged out of her mind she’s smarter than any person he’s ever known. She might even be smarter than him. Even half of Riley’s attention and mad genius focused on making him feel good means that this is not going to last long, because she seems to find his every weakness, every way to make him gasp and moan.

It crashes over him with every touch, every stroke. Mac puts his other hand on her neck, caressing her with a back-and-forth motion of his thumb. When he gets close, he touches his thumb to her lips, brushing across them, wishing he was kissing her, but not brave enough to close the distance between them.

Which is ridiculous because her hand is on his cock and he literally had his mouth on her clit a few hours ago, but he’s scared to kiss her. 

She moves her hand in a way that should be criminal, and Mac throws his head back as release hits him. 

It takes him a few moments before he can open his eyes and look at her, but his hand hasn’t strayed from her cheek, her lips. He watches with rapt attention as she puts a hand to his sternum, then slides the other between her legs. He can’t take his eyes off of her slack jaw, her blown pupils, the way she rolls her hips against his hand. 

It doesn’t take long. She doesn’t make a sound this time, but he watches it crest through her like a wave, and he thinks it’s the most beautiful she’s ever looked.

And maybe coming has knocked all sense out of his head, maybe he’s riding on all the feel-good hormones released during his climax, but he _wants_ to kiss her. Before he can even really think through the implications of that, he’s sliding his hand around to the back of her neck to pull her closer, press his forehead to hers.

And then she’s jerking back, up off the couch, saying something about the bathroom and needing to go.

Mac just stares at the closing door behind her. Then he puts his hand to his forehead and mutters, “Shit. Shit, shit, shit.”

He rubs at his eyes with the pads of his fingers, then cleans himself up and tugs on his pants.

A glance at the bathroom door confirms that it is still closed and Riley is still inside. Mac goes over, but hesitates for a moment before knocking quietly. 

“Riley?” Mac asks softly. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” Her voice is muffled from behind the door. “I will be, I just—”

There’s a moment of quiet, and then the door is opening. 

“I’m sorry,” he says right out of the gate. “We didn’t… we didn’t talk about that and I shouldn’t have—”

“No—” she says quickly. “We can’t overthink this. We can’t…” She licks her lips and his gaze instantly drops to her mouth. “I won’t let this break us and neither will you. Promise me that now.”

Mac holds up three fingers. “I promise, Riles.”

Then he opens his arms, and this hug is effortless

She falls forward into his hug, letting her forehead rest against his shoulder. “Okay,” she says. “Good. You’re too important to me to lose.”

He cups the back of her head with his hand and rocks them a little side to side. This is normal. This is safe. This is what their relationship is, through the good and the bad. It’s them. Together. Holding onto each other. They can get through this. He really does believe that.

They curl up in his bed. He wraps his body around her, but even though she falls asleep right away, Mac lies awake. He can smell the sweetness of her shampoo, feel the press of her body against his.

Sometime after he finally drifts off, he’s woken by the sound of her cries. He replaces her hand between her legs with his own, kissing the back of her neck. 

He hovers somewhere between waking and sleeping for a while, and then something off prickles at the edge of his awareness. Riley’s temperature is elevated. He flips her over, onto her back. “Riles?” he tries, but she doesn’t wake.

Fuck. Fuck fuck _fuck_.

Mac thinks through the files he’s read. High fever was one of the late stage symptoms reported before death. He checks her pulse. It’s there, but it's fast.

_Fuck_. He’s got to get her temperature down. He yells her name again, but she doesn’t respond. He thinks maybe that is what scares him the most.

And then Mac moves. Fast. First to the bathroom to start filling the tub. Then to the kitchen, where he grabs two ice cube trays. He dumps the ice into the bath, then gets a cool compress because it’s taking too long for the tub to fill. When he finally puts the cloth to her forehead, her eyes flutter a bit. Her shirt is drenched in sweat and her body is slick with it.

Mac pulls her shirt over her head and then pulls her panties down her legs. She feels so small as he scoops her up, reminded of the first time he carried her like this, which she was dying for a completely different reason.

She’s _not_ dying, he tells himself. She’s not. He won’t let her.

“It hurts,” she whimpers. “Mac, it hurts _so much_.”

“I’m sorry,” he answers, and he _is_. 

“I think…” she whispers, “I think I’m dying, Mac. Don’t let me—”

“No,” he says firmly. “No, you’re not. I got you. I’m not gonna let you die.”

He lowers her into the cold water slowly. Her teeth are chattering. She still doesn’t seem fully aware of what’s happening, and that reminds him too much of the last few moments of the test subjects before they—

He grits his teeth. Riley is _not_ dying. She just needs to come. Fast. What he really needs is something to help make that happen. He glances up, spies the showerhead, and gets an idea.

She climaxes blessedly fast once he’s guided the pulsing stream of water between her legs. 

And then he’s scooping her up from the tub, wrapping a towel around her. He stares at her, relief flooding through every molecule of his body.

He can’t hold himself together a second longer. The intensity of it overwhelms him, and he sheds hot, stinging tears, hiding his face against her shoulder.

“I’m okay,” she tells him, one hand coming up to cradle the back of his head. “I’m okay. You’ve got me. You’ve still got me. I’m still here.”

But she almost wasn’t. That thought tears through him with devastating impact. She almost wasn’t.

She was almost gone. And she’s probably—definitely—the one person it would utterly destroy him to lose.

Exhausted and naked, they fall back into bed. When Riley starts to fuss with her wet hair, Mac braids it back for her. He’s not skilled enough to french braid, but he understands the basic mechanics of a three-strand braid just fine. Well enough to plait her hair back.

He doesn’t sleep much. He snags fragmented pieces here and there, always scared he’s going to drift off and Riley will need him.

He makes her climax with his fingers, with his tongue. At one point he’s just trying to keep her stable in between episodes and he’s pretty sure she comes just from his mouth on her breast. He takes breaks to get her water; he makes sure he uses plenty of lube.

He holds her during her refractory period, letting their bodies mesh together, limbs intertwined.

He doesn’t want to admit that it’s the most intensely intimate experience of his life. Not necessarily because they’re both naked, or that she’s constantly orgasming in his arms, but there’s something deeper, beyond that.

That she trusts him with this, when he doesn’t even really trust himself. She trusts him with her whole body, completely. He doesn’t think there’s a part of her he hasn’t touched. He doesn’t think there’s a part of him she hasn’t touched.

When the sun starts to rise, Mac gives up on sleep and goes to make coffee. He pours himself a mug, takes a few sips, and tries to settle himself by picking up one of his scrap pieces of wood and beginning to carve it. He’s not sure what it’s going to be yet, but he feels some of it taking shape.

Riley pads out of the bed room a few minutes later. 

“Hey,” she says. He’s about to go pour her a mug of coffee, but before he can, she takes his mug and takes a few sips. He lets her have it.

“Matty’s gonna stop by in a bit with some breakfast,” Mac tells her. The text had come in just a few minutes ago. “I told her to leave it on the porch. You got anything you need her to bring?”

She stares down into his mug of coffee. “My dignity back?” she says nervously.

As if he thinks less of her? As if he ever could?

“You’ve got plenty here,” Mac replies. “Promise.”

He thinks of those moments last night where her skin had felt like fire, when he was worried she was slipping away.

He sets down the knife and the piece of wood he’s been carving. “You came close, last night, to—” One of his hands clenches into a fist. “I want to kill whoever made this fucking thing.” 

She puts her hand over his. It’s such a simple touch, but he thinks he feels it through his whole body. “Thanks for keeping me alive. You know, on a semi-weekly basis.” 

Matty drops off styrofoam containers of eggs, bacon, and french toast. Mac eats too quickly to enjoy it. Riley picks at her food.

Once breakfast is done, Riley tells him to try and sleep. She settles in with her laptop on the bed beside him. He doesn’t think he’ll sleep, but he’s wrong. He drifts off almost immediately.

He wakes up to her hand on his shoulder. He doesn’t think, he just reaches for her. He’s barely awake, but he feels her body jolt when she comes. He’s only put an arm across her middle, but that must have been enough. 

“You were supposed to wake me,” he says, tugging her closer so he can rest his head on her stomach.

“Sorry,” she says. “I thought I could handle it. Turns out I couldn’t.”

“But you’re okay?” he asks.

“I’m good,” she answers. When she gently combs her fingers through his hair, he closes his eyes in contentment. There’s something about the touch that feels settling, familiar. Like the touch of his mother when he was little. He dozes. 

He wakes up when the Chinese food Riley ordered arrives. They eat quietly, then spend the first part of the afternoon reading and coding, respectively.

Mac hears her breathing change sometime in the early afternoon, and he gets her off with his mouth and tongue. 

They play some Mario Kart, which he loses spectacularly, then some battleship, which he loses _less_ spectacularly. 

And then before they can start a second game, Riley is standing up and pacing, twisting her hair around her fingers as she moves back and forth.

Mac asks what she needs, but she shakes her head, so he waits.

Finally, she climbs onto his lap, putting her hands to his shoulders. He runs his own hands down her spine, understanding that she needs the touch. 

“I need to ask you something,” she says, and he can see the want in her eyes and hear it in her voice. “I need to ask you something and if you don’t want to I need you to tell me no.”

“Okay,” he says gently, already knowing his answer. “Tell me what you need?”

She moves her hands up from his shoulders, cupping his face in her hands. “You,” she says. “Please.”

He frowns at her for a second; his realization dawns slow. Once he understands what she’s asking, however, it doesn’t change anything. “I can give you that,” he tells her, and then—“Let me give you that.”

He wants to kiss her; he’s _dying_ to, in fact. He doesn’t, though. He stands, holding her in his arms, taking slow steps into the bedroom before lowering her onto the bed. He helps pull her shirt over her head. He lets her take off his own. She must remember from the night before, because she runs her nails over his abdomen and he gasps in pleasure. 

She flicks open his belt impatiently, unbuttons his jeans and helps him step out of them. He watches how she bites her lower lip as he pulls off her underwear.

He settles himself between her legs, kissing his way up her body. He’s hard and aching and it would feel so good to be inside her, but he takes his time. He can’t kiss her lips, but he can kiss every other part of her. Mac grabs a packet of condoms and a bottle of lube from the nightstand. Once that is taken care of, she puts her hands on him and guides him inside her. 

She rocks her hips, and he swears he nearly loses his mind with just how _good_ she feels, with how _right_ this feels, him and her together. 

He slides in deeper. She’s so wet, and every roll of her hips makes pleasure spiral through him, coiling tight at the base of his spine. She pulls him down to her. He puts his lips by her ear and tells her how good she feels, how she’s driving him crazy. 

Her heels dig into his lower back, and he has to fight every screaming part of his body that wants him to move faster. At some point he reaches between them to circle her clit. She clenches down _hard_ around him and it feels like flying. His brain realizes that she’s orgasmed, but he’s still thrusting into her. Then she’s spasming around him again and it finally clicks.

He goes completely still: “Are you okay? Should I pull out?”

She shakes her head. “Come on,” she encourages. “Come on, take me.” She digs her nails into the skin of his shoulders as he picks up the pace again. The sharp bite of her nails mixes with the pleasure, and he loses himself in it as it crashes over him.

He really doesn’t mean to just pass out on top of her, but he does anyway. His body just feels completely spent, and even as they both lie there panting, it takes considerable effort for him to prop himself up a little so his weight is off of her. 

“You all good?” Mac asks, his voice muffled because his face is pressed against her neck.

She actually laughs. He feels it through her whole body. “You can’t tell that I’m good? I am very good.”

He laughs right along with her. “Probably the drug.”

He pushes back a little more, slipping out of her, and he catches her wince when he does.

“Sorry.” He grimaces a little, rolling over all the way off of her. He watches her with lidded eyes as she draws a finger down his chest. “Shower?”

She sighs contentedly. “Yes, please.”

In the shower, she falls back against him. He can tell she’s exhausted. He helps lather up her hair with shampoo and then rinse it out. 

They’re naked. They’re tired. When Riley’s shoulders sag and she lets out a tiny sound, Mac knows it’s building inside her again. He pulls her body against his, touching her slowly and easily. Shower sex is logistically tricky. It’s slippery and awkward. Mac’s just thankful he has a good non-slip mat and a handrail in his shower. 

She’s louder this time, more vocal. It’s not just telling him what she wants or needs, it’s her telling him that he feels good, that she loves how he makes her feel.

And if she says his name when she comes this time, he tries not to think too hard about that. 

They eat dinner and ice cream and start _John Wick_. Mac’s distracted for the first part because he _hates_ the scene where the dog dies. Not long after that though, he notices Riley’s not really paying attention. He clicks the pause button.

“Hey.” He nudges her thigh with his toe. “I can hear you thinking.”

She glances sideways at him, but doesn’t answer.

“Riles,” he drags out the nickname playfully. “You wanna tell me what’s up?”

It’s not the drug, he knows that much. Something else is bothering her, and he really hopes it’s not the way he’s been helping her these past few times. 

She blows out a long, steady breath. “Tell me the truth,” she says. “Am I—Is this messing up your chances with Desi?”

That’s so far from what Mac expected her to say that she may as well have just randomly stated that day is night. He blinks at her in surprise. “What?”

“You like her, Mac,” Riley says. “You have since, well, not long after she started working with us.”

She’s not _wrong_. He does like Desi. She’s quick on her feet and smart in her own way and he trusts her to protect him and his team.

But that’s not what Riley is saying. She’s perceptive, and he’s not really all that surprised that she picked up on the fact that his _liking_ of Desi goes a few steps past the platonic. For her to suggest that she’s ruining his chances, or that he’s giving Desi up to help Riley...

“So?” he asks. “I’ve liked lots of people. Sometimes it works out—for a while, at least—and sometimes it just doesn’t. That’s life, Riles.”

He leans across the couch and takes both of her hands in his. “If helping you means I never get a chance to explore any sort of what if ’s with Desi, that’s a trade off I’m more than willing to make.”

She squeezes his hands. It’s like wrapping a warm blanket around his shoulders. “I swear, Angus MacGyver, you’re too good for this world.” 

“Too pure, huh?” he teases.

“Most cinnamon-y of all the cinnamon rolls,” Riley agrees with a smile.

And there’s that feeling again, low in his gut. Not arousal, not desire, not anything he feels when he looks at Desi. Something different. Something infinitely more profound and sacred.

Something that causes him to lean in towards her, want to touch her, want to _kiss_ her.

“I hate this thing,” she tells him, and he can see the tears in her eyes. “I really, really hate it.”

He pulls her into his arms, lays back against the couch so she’s cradled against his chest, and turns the movie back on. 

By the time the credits roll, she’s straddling his waist and letting him slip his hands underneath her shirt. 

“Never thought I’d be tired of sex,” she mutters. He pulls off her shirt. 

“Just a little while longer,” he tells her. “We’ve almost got you through this. We’re so close. You’re doing so good, Riles. So good.”

He wants to kiss her properly, but he compromises by putting his lips against her throat, her jawline.

He moves in closer to her, kissing the underside of her jaw and down her neck. He gets her off with his fingers while she begs him to make her come with tears streaming down her face. The sight twists up something in his gut. He tells her that he’s got her, that she’s going to be okay. 

She falls asleep against him, and it’s not long before he drifts off as well. Sometime in the middle of the night, she wakes again. Mac takes her hand and leads her into the bedroom.

He doesn’t say anything while she undresses him, slowly. She’s completely naked and he’s completely dressed when she unbuttons his shirt and slides it off his shoulders. Her eyes shine in the dark. She looks up at him and keeps her gaze on his eyes as she unbuttons his pants.

With her palm on his chest, she guides him back to the bed, barely applying any pressure from her hand before he’s stepping back, sitting down on the mattress. She presses a little harder, and he falls back, staring up at her in the shadows of the room.

He has to fight the urge to thrust his hips up when she takes him in her mouth, but the tiredness that sinks into him helps him stay still. She uses her tongue and her hands with wicked skill, and he shudders and gasps at her gentle touch, at the wet heat of her mouth. 

He’s close when she pulls away, climbing onto him and sinking herself down. Her hand and mouth might have felt good, but _she_ feels better. She starts to move, and Mac takes her hand, intertwining their fingers together.

He looks up at her and just sees _Riley_. Beautiful, brilliant, inventive Riley. Important, in every way. Drawing their clasped hands to his mouth, Mac kisses her palm. Then he places a kiss to each fingertip. Then the inside of her wrist.

Riley changes the angle by leaning forward, and everything gets so much better. She puts a hand to his cheek and her forehead to hers and he _cannot_ kiss her, he knows this, but that doesn’t stop the need.

This is about something different than it was a day ago. This is more, deeper. She has to feel it too, doesn’t she? He thinks she must, but he’s so lost in pleasure and sensation the thoughts are there and gone again a moment later.

They come one after the other, like a circuit closing. Him and her connected together like they were never supposed to be apart.

He falls asleep with her body pressed against his, her chest to his back. He feels her fingers tracing patterns on his skin and her lips kissing the back of his neck. 

He knows, in the morning, that it’s over. It takes a single look at her, and he figures it out. At first he tries to pretend that it’s just a longer refractory period, but he _knows_ , somewhere deep inside himself. They pass the day in comfortable companionship. 

But Mac’s right. She’s fine. They eat pizza and more ice cream and when Riley says, “I think it’s over,” he can’t contradict her. There is, however, one thing he can do. 

“Stay the night,” he says. “Just in case.”

She does.

They climb into bed and settle down side by side with a good amount of space between their bodies. There are too many emotions inside Mac, and he hasn’t had enough time to parse through them. There’s just too much, and he can’t seem to get into a good headspace to lay them out side by side and analyse everything.

But then she takes his hand, and his brain goes wonderfully, peacefully, quiet.

“We said this doesn’t change anything, right?” Riley asks.

“I promised,” Mac says.

“Will you, uh, will you hold me?”

He pulls her into his arms like it’s the easiest thing in the world because it _is_. Everything with Riley is easy.

Except, maybe, somehow, the end of _this_. Whatever this is.

When he wakes up in the morning alone in bed, he thinks he shouldn’t be sad about it. He is confused, though, until he walks into the kitchen and finds Riley making coffee. She hands him a cup. 

“I think I’m going to just call an Uber,” she says.

Mac takes a sip. He shakes his head. “I can give you a lift home, just let me wake up.”

“Are you sure?”

There’s something in her face he can’t read, and he can _always_ read her face. It’s unnerving that he can’t now. “Yeah. You want to stop and get pancakes on the way?” Maybe if they take a break and get food they can get back to normal and not still be in this strange halfway-point.

He swears she looks actually _pained_ , and he wonders if it’s regret. If now that things are over she regrets how far they went, how far he let her go. 

“No, I really just…” she hesitates. “I really just want to go home.”

He looks down at his coffee. Of course. It’s only normal that she would want to go home. He just doesn’t want her to go if she’s mad or upset with him. 

Fifteen minutes later, Riley steps into the entryway with a duffle bag slung over her shoulder. “Ready?” Mac asks, offering a smile. 

“Yeah,” she says. The smile she gives in return doesn’t meet her eyes.

The car ride is silent. Mac knows the way from his place to Riley’s by heart, and usually he’s happy it’s a quick drive, but today it feels like it passes all too soon. He wants to say something, tell her _something_. He doesn’t know if he should apologize or beg forgiveness or what he needs to do.

When he pulls up to her apartment building, he throws the car in park and turns off the ignition, climbing out of the car. 

He wants to say _something_ , but Riley beats him to it. 

“See you, uh, in a couple of days, I guess,” Riley says.

And then, because Mac still has no words, but he knows _Riley_ , and he knows the best thing to do when there aren’t words, he holds open his arms. She doesn’t even hesitate to accept the hug. She’s close to him again. It feels right.

When she pulls away, he thinks he sees tears in her eyes. “You’re a good friend, Mac. The best.” He doesn’t miss the way her voice catches when she says his name. “I guess I owe you my life a few more times over.”

He tries for a smile and a light tone. “So I figure I got to save you a few more times and we’ll finally be even.”

She gives him a fake punch on the shoulder that he pretends to wince at. “See you,” he says, and she nods. 

“See you,” she says, giving him a half-hearted wave.

She climbs the steps to her front door. He waits a moment to see if she’ll turn around, but she’s still looking away when he starts the car and throws it into reverse.

Back at home, Mac changes his shoes and goes for a run. There’s too much inside him, churning about, and he thinks maybe it will clear his head. It does, for a while, but then he hops in the shower and all he can see is _Riley_ , there with him. He can remember the sensation of his hands in her hair, on her back, skin wet.

He gets out, towels off, but when he steps into the bedroom he sees Riles on the bed, feverish and crying. His couch is similarly possessed. The afternoon passes with him wandering around his house aimlessly, trying to focus on one thing or another, but never able to settle down for long. He eats leftover pizza and thinks about arguing with Riley about pineapple on pizza.

Mac finally grabs a ladder, hauls it into his bedroom, and starts to take apart his ceiling fan, setting the pieces on his mattress one-by-one.

As he does, he starts with what he knows.

What he knows, in no particular order, is this:

He can not bear to see Riley in distress or pain. The fact that someone hurt her, violated her like they did makes Mac want to shed blood.

He did not, throughout the past few days, keep his emotions in check. Instead they spread like wildfire, consuming him. His feelings _are_ entangled in this, he’s just not sure how deeply.

He meant what he said when he told Riley she was important to him. She _is_ important to him. He just hadn’t quite realized how deeply that ran until the past few days.

Riley is beautiful. She’s always been beautiful in his eyes, just not… He’s not sure. Any thought of moving past friendship with her has always been something he shied away from. It wasn’t smart. It wasn’t professional. She didn’t like him like that. She didn’t look at him the way he knows she looked at Billy.

Except all those sentences are in past tense. Because Riley _did_ look at him like that. She did look at him like she wanted him. Was that the drug? Was it her?

He doesn’t know.

And maybe it doesn’t matter. Riley’s feelings are _Riley’s_ to sort out. All he can do, the _best_ thing he can do is figure out his own.

And perhaps, the answer to his own is staring him right in the face: He wanted to kiss her.

Mac closes his eyes. Oh, he is an _idiot_.

He is the dumbest, most obtuse person who ever lived.

He stares at his fan, in pieces on the bed, screws and light bulbs and various pieces. It makes complete sense to him, every single piece has a purpose and a place and even seeing them all spread out he _knows_ how they fit together.

And he knows how he and Riley fit together too. He’s seen what it could be. Not the sex, necessarily, but fighting about pizza, relaxing together, playing video games and cards. That part. The part where she’s his _friend_.

They _fit_.

Mac runs out of the room, grabbing his car keys from their spot on the dresser as he does.

Riley yanks open her apartment door with a quiet: “Hi.

“Hi,” he answers. “I think I need to break a promise, Riles.”

She frowns at him, opening her mouth to say something, but—

He’s stepping forward, his hands are cupping her face, and his gaze is heavy and intense on hers. She backs up, and he moves forward, kicking the door shut behind him. 

“Can I kiss you?” he asks in a low, tender voice. “Not because of a drug or anything, but just because I want to and you want me to?”

“Do you?” she whispers, and he sees uncertainty in her eyes, but beneath that there’s a spark of hope. “Do you want to?”

He blows out a slow breath. “More than I’ve wanted anything else in my entire life.” 

She presses her hands to his abdomen, grabbing his shirt by fistfulls and using it to tug him closer. “Why, Mac?”

He cannot, under any circumstances, tell her that she’s like his ceiling fan. He goes for the next best thing. The words he’s been rehearsing during the car ride over. “Because you’re my person, Riles. You’re my person. I trust you. I count on you. I need you. Come hell or highwater, you’re it.”

“But, Desi?”

The question is so ridiculous he almost laughs. Desi hasn’t had his heart tied up in knots for the past twenty-four hours. He doesn’t know if Desi could kick his butt at Mario Kart. He doesn’t think Desi would ever trust him to braid her hair, or to even take care of her if something like this were to happen. Desi is _not Riley_ , and as soon as his brain figured that out, it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Desi’s great, and maybe in another universe, another lifetime, we’d move past what if someday, but Desi’s not you. The what if question that I want to answer is the one about you.” His gaze is still on hers. He waits. He searches her eyes for an answer she hasn’t given yet, hoping against hope that he finds it there. “I promised nothing would change and I will stick by that if that’s what you really want, but Riley: I’m your person too.”

Tears well up in her eyes, and she says, voice caught up between laughter and thick emotion: “Damn right you are.”

And then he kisses her. Instantly, he regrets not doing it sooner. He thinks somewhere in the back of his mind that being inside her and kissing her would be fantastic. Like combustible chemicals mixing together to create _fire_. 

He drops his hands from her face, bends a little at the knees, and scoops her up in his arms. She wraps herself tightly around him, and all he can think is he wants her this close forever and always.

When he pulls away, his eyes are wet with tears. Hers are too. 

Riley drops her head to his shoulder, breath coming in deep pants. “This sounds awful,” she says, “But we’re going to need to wait a while to have sex.”

He laughs. “I figured. In the meantime do you think you could be convinced to let me date you?”

“You’re the one who’s gotta tell Jack.” She leans back. He doesn’t like the distance so he moves forward to kiss the tip of her nose. “And Matty,” she adds.

“If I’m telling Jack, you’re telling Matty,” he argues.

Riley feigns concern. “Matty’s scarier than Jack.”

“Mmhmm,” he kisses her neck with soft, barely-there kisses. How has he missed this so much already?

“I’ll tell Bozer,” she says, and he vaguely remembers the topic of conversation. “You can tell everybody else.”

He scrapes his teeth against her skin, and she shivers. She slides a hand up to grip his hair and pull his head back. “No sex, MacGyver.”

He wants to tell her that if she doesn’t want to have sex, tugging at his hair like that is not a good way to do it. He just respects the situation enough to keep his mouth shut. 

Mac lets her down, settling her on her own two feet. He kind of figured that sex was off the table for a while. “Can I sleep over anyway?”

“Yeah,” she tells him, tapping a finger against his chin. “I’m very good with that. You snore, but you give really good cuddles.”

He bends forward to kiss her again, chaste and sweet. Then he gathers her up in his arms, letting his chin rest on top of her head. She feels like home. Like belonging. He holds her close. He thinks, maybe, he’s loved her from the moment they met, the moment he set his hands on hers, the moment he picked her cuffs and she looked at him like he created the stars. He thinks he loved her for too long without realizing it. He thinks he loves her now, pressed against his chest. He thinks maybe there was never a moment he _didn’t_ love her. 

He thinks about how, when it comes to loving Riley Davis, he always will.  
  


* * *

_end._

**Author's Note:**

> Hearteyes and thanks to storiesofimagination, Abbie, and ohemgeeitscoley for their support, cheering, and beta-ing.
> 
> And huge thank you's to everyone who read and commented on the OG fic because this fic would not exist without some of those comments. Next up in this series should be the actual sequel. I think??? It's not like I'm going to rewrite this fic from Matty's POV, although if you WANT that you should let me know on tumblr (andyouweremine) or twitter (KrisIsTheWorst), though it will NOT be 10K+ words. It just won't be.
> 
> ANYWAY. If you've read both, mind letting me know what the best/your favorite part of a Mac POV was? This is the first time I've rewritten a fic from the opposite POV and I am so curious. <3 <3 <3


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